


Welcome to Earth

by FailedBroadcast



Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: One Shot, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Praxians, Praxus, mentions of abuse, non-canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-03-02 17:31:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18815668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FailedBroadcast/pseuds/FailedBroadcast
Summary: After escaping from a Decepticon prison, two young Cybertronians find themselves stranded on Earth.





	1. Touchdown

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [You have Found a Home](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/480901) by Cairistona. 
  * Inspired by [My Family, My Home](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/480904) by Cairistona. 



“If someone had told me Earth was so dirty I would have probably tried to crash in a different solar system.”

Starbit chuffed at her friend's light-sparked tone.

“It’s literally in the name, Luseon.” She typed in a few lines of code at her terminal, a weak attempt at debugging the cruiser’s systems.

The two young Cybertronians had quickly made home in a sheltered, somewhat charred glade in the middle of a remote spruce forest. They had to learn the local language of the area, but both were more comfortable speaking their native lingo. Still, some of the words didn’t mesh well with their own.

Luseon polished his chest plate, chipping out the occasional dab of mud that collected on the frame from his earlier patrol. He had draped a woven metal blanket over his chassis for modesty’s sake. 

Wings twitching in irritation, he scoffed, “I guess. But don't you think this is a little overboard?”

Starbit bit her lower faceplate as she initiated the startup, not hearing Luseon. She could hear the system kick itself on, the engine humming to life. She was on the tips of her pedes when the terminal beeped an all too familiar tone, reading off an error message. The system powered off, making it the fifth time that micro-cycle.

Starbit let out a whir of frustration. “It failed again.” 

She turned to face Luseon, plopping down on the dirt. The two were settled at the rear of the starship, the back hatch open, sitting around strewn supplies, weapons, rations, all the sort.

“Hey, it's alright-”

“No, it's not!” Starbit snapped, letting her frustration get the best of her. Her digits curled inward in frustration. “It's really not! Of all the places to get stranded, it’s Earth, one of the few places in the entire galaxy to be crawling with both factions. I can only hope it's the Autobots who find us first, Primus forbid the Decepticons do...” Starbit hopelessly set her head on her knees, feeling the tug of a sob creeping up her chassis. Luseon set down his armor and quickly crossed over to Starbit, rubbing her backside gently.

“Don't get so worked up, this isn't worth getting overheated over.” Luseon regarded her with worry. Not long into their voyage did Starbit contract some sort a virus. He wasn’t sure what it was, as he was no medic, but it didn’t take a doctor to know she was sick, and overheating wouldn’t help her at all.

“It's just...” Starbit hitched, rubbing her damp optics. “We didn't escape that damn con-run prison and steal this cruiser just to happen upon another con-infested planet! I don't think it's unreasonable to be a little upset-” she stopped herself to cough. A glowing discharge spittled on her arm. The virus, no doubt, Luseon thought. She nonchalantly brushed it off, closing her optics against the needle-filtered sunlight. Luseon hesitated, waiting for another fit of coughs.

When they didn’t come, he continued. “No, of course it isn't.” Luseon settled next to her, wincing against the dirt. He took out his polishing cloth and rubbed the spittle off her forearm. “But it isn't just the 'cons anymore; we’ve got the Autobots...” He considered himself for a second, pausing his cleaning, before resuming: “...hopefully on our side. And if it comes down to it, you know I've got your back, no matter what.”

Starbit chuckled a bit, “Yeah I know, Mr. I-made-top-of-class. No one could best your aim.”

Luseon's lavender optics sparked, his voice a tad smug. He looked to the sky, a hand posed on his chassis. “The drill coach admitted himself that I might’ve rivaled Ironhide.”

“As if!” Starbit gasped. “No-one’s heard of Ironhide since the Great War.”

Luseon ignored her, indulging himself. “Maybe we could meet up, exchange battle strategies and swap out blaster pieces....”

“Oh shut up,” she nudged his shoulder, now in a proper giggling fit. Luseon smiled, happy to be able to get her out of one of her moods. The initial excitement from the escape had soon faded after initiating the hyperdrive, and Luseon had seen enough of her dips before to know when they were coming on. 

She looked down again, settling her giggles. Her smile sobered, “Thanks.”

Luseon nodded, already knowing. “It’s fine. We’ll get through this. We didn't crash here from halfway across the galaxy to give up,” He put back the cloth and pushed himself to his pedes, holding out dactylin. Starbit took hold of his servo and he lifted her up.

“I know,” she mused softly, mostly to herself. She nodded and looked to Luseon, repeating more firmly, “I know.”

He smiled brightly, then took back his place on the crate he was leaning on. Starbit brushed her faceplate briefly, feeling flushed, before returning to the terminal. The two left each other to their own devices for the remainder of that cycle.

The solar cycle was weird on this planet; it seemed the day was a brief second before twilight hit the sky in a soft, pleasing violet. Stars twinkled - twinkling! She had never seen stars shimmer like this before - above them as the solar star slipped below the horizon. It wasn't long before it was night, and a singular cold moon rose, giving some natural light to the already dimly lit clearing. 

All the while, Starbit kept getting returned more or less the same exit codes. 

She never thought of herself as a good programmer. In the encampment, any sort of enrichment was sparse, and if the patrols found out any of them had found something mildly entertaining it would be snatched away to be smelted as punishment.

She had been privileged though; Starbit had been singled out for being relatively smarter than her peers and was allowed to learn about the more advanced technology available to the outpost. But that wasn’t even programming, if she was honest to herself. It wasn't like she had swathes of data pads lying around teaching her about every bit of the occupation. What they had her do was more like rewiring, or at the most, simplistic hacking, but this...

She was trying to tackle a defunct starship. The syntax and even some the words used was foreign to her, and it wasn’t the first time that cycle she thought that this wasn’t exactly Decepticon technology she was tackling.

The soft clicking of latching armor told her that Luseon was preparing to end the night. She turned to see that his wings were slightly drooping from exhaustion. They had been up for the past 35 micro-cycles, and although that wasn’t quite unusual for their kind, they spent most of their time on the voyage powered down so it was difficult to adjust so quickly. 

Starbit sighed as the terminal beeped once more, not even looking at the error message. She pressed a button to turn the monitor off. The debugging could wait until tomorrow.

She went to gather up the mess they had made when she noticed that Luseon tensed himself. She looked up from her hoard to see his optics were trained on the darkness absorbing the forest beyond them. She noticed his antennae twitching, and he reached for the blaster clipped to his hip. He prowled forward, careful in his steps.

Starbit steadied herself and kneeled against the ground. She wasn’t sure what he caught in his sensors and hers was inhibited from the virus, so she pinged him on his comm channel.

// What’s going on? //

// I definitely heard something, and it didn’t sound like the local fauna.// He paused to look at her, lavender meeting ice. // Are you alright with me checking it out?//

He knew better than to ask her that, of course she wasn’t alright with it. She wasn’t too naiive to know it could definitely be something Cybertronian. She bit her lower mouthplate in apprehension.

//What can you make of it right now?//

He looked back to the forest, pausing for a moment before pinging back. 

// There’s a heightened electric field this way. I can’t really make it out though, the... trees are messing with my sensors.// The word ’tree’ didn’t easily roll off the glossia, it wasn’t translatable to their language so they had to find out through the local native population’s language, which that in of itself was a feat to master. 

//Not to mention the magnetic field on this planet! It keeps messing with my sensors, so the e-field I’m picking up might be nothing at all, but still...//

The end of his transmission indicated a request. Starbit didn’t doubt his senses - a Praxian’s sensors were more equipped for stealthy investigations like this one, so if he picked something up it must be worth checking out.  
// Go ahead,// she pinged back. // It wouldn’t hurt to patrol anyway, we have been here for awhile.//

Luseon gave a nod, more confident in his steps. Starbit quickly handled all the items back into the loading bay and retreated into the ship, manually shutting the hatch. The forest had been silent the entirety of their stay, but even she had to admit it was entirely too quiet for comfort. Any sound felt like an intrusion on this foreign planet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi there! Here's another one-shot I came up with yesterday!
> 
> The funky thing about this story is that there's going to be a lot of in-canon characters referenced and acted out in this story. You may find they might not act exactly behave the way you know them, and I take full blame for that. I don't have the money to buy out the many spreads of comics available and the wiki can only do so much to help me understand the core traits of each character. I'm sorry for this!
> 
> I'm also trying to use kind-of-canon vernacular to add to the general setting of the story. Much thanks to Leathurkatt-TFTiggy back on DeviantArt for their vocab compilations!
> 
> Beyond that, I really hope you enjoy this so far! I hope to work on it for the most of the summer since I don't see myself being very busy.
> 
> The tags and characters will be updated with each chapter.
> 
> If you have some questions, shoot me an ask at opprotunemoment.tumblr.com!
> 
> Also make sure to check out my inspirations for the story :)
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


	2. Anticipation

Starbit busied herself by cracking a light stick to serving as some sort of illumination in the dark ship. Even with the engine dead, she could feel the inner workings hum with residual energy. It felt familiar and comforted her into a strange sort of light power down, allowing her to recompile her thoughts and memories.

Her thoughts ventured to before the crash landing when they had initially escaped from the encampment. What was deemed as a military outpost to outsiders, it was more a less a prison for young Cybertronians captured by the Decepticons to be ‘indoctrinated’ to Megatron’s faction. She remembered watching many a spark falling to his devious tactics and scripture. 

And who wouldn’t? Starbit knew she had fallen to Megatron’s suave way of talking and conversation, and the vulnerable, malleable mind of a mech- or femme-ling was all too easy to manipulate.

She had also been subjected to a lot of abuse. It didn’t take a scholar to know that femmes were sparse in the galaxy, and the guards wasted no time to make their rounds when they felt like with and taking advantage of her. She had stopped counting the cycles after what seemed like millennia, further testimony to what could have been a permanent automatonic apathy for her psyche.

Until she had met Luseon.

As soon as he was dropped off, he had struck a mild curiosity throughout the prison. He had his flightless wings and chevron helm to blame - a trademark of the rare Praxian. Praxians were a different sect of Cybertronians - they were Cybertronians at the core, no doubt, but their culture and physiology were largely different from the surrounding capitals, and they were subject to ostracization.

They hailed from the like-named city of Praxus. Like many cities alongside it, the war had claimed the culturally-rich capital into no more than decrepit rubble, leaving the already threatened sect stranded and more or less extinct.

Paired with a rather unusual name and lavender optics to match, Luseon had found himself a rather popular and arguably infamous fellow amongst the prison; infamous only because he too had a way with words, but of the mouthy sort.

Starbit smiled as she recalled how brave he was against the guards, even against the guard’s threats and harsh punishments. She remembered fondly of their first conversation. They were in a poorly named recreational hall - more like another cell, but bigger and with windows to the vacuum of space outside. Vorn-bound cliques had already been made around her as she walked into the court. She noticed a distinct gaggle of mechlings forming in the center of the court, and she climbed an elevated column next to another femme to get a clearer look at what was happening.

In the middle of the gathering was Luseon. He made a stance beyond a crumbled looking, very small ground-framer, who had looked thoroughly beat up. She couldn’t make out the words but noticed how Luseon passionately spoke out against a seeker-guard that brandished a baton, of whom was looking very pissed and impatient. 

The femme next to her gasped when Luseon relaxed his stance and held out his arms a submission. Starbit looked on, hungry to know what would come next. The guard gave a disgusting smile and at full force, started to pelt him. The crowd had started to ease off as Luseon started to cry out in pain in place of the ground-framer, and Starbit couldn’t help but feel her tank flip as she slid down the column and ventured to a wall. She lowered herself to the hard, cold floor and held her faceplate in an attempt to keep down her earlier meal. 

She jumped when she heard a clunk of metal slump beside her. She looked to see Luseon just sitting next to her. She noticed, although his faceplate was thick with pain, his optics glittered with determination. His armor had brunt most of the force of the hits of the baton. She was surprised to find he still had most of it, she figured the guards would have taken it for pawning or smelting. 

Starbit didn’t realize she was staring until he spoke up.

“I saw you up there, looking down.”

His voice was staticky. She noticed that the area around his voicebox was bruised.

She felt a shameful blush come on. Of course she was looking down. It was all too easy to get dangerously bored in a place like this, so anything new was immediately given attention to, even if it was something like a public beating.

“Eh, I don’t really blame you. I admit I’ve been getting pretty aimless myself. But I would have been no better than these Pit-Spawn of Decepti-scum if allowed Lorken to take a beating like that,” He grimaced harshly, spitting out the insults like tainted energon. Briefly, though, his face softened. “He’s not much older than a sparkling.”

Starbit was quiet, awestruck at his foolishly brazen words. She sat criss-cross, letting her dactylins fall in her lap. She looked at the ground, unsure of what to say to the Praxian.

“You’re not much for conversation are you?”

Starbit immediately sat up and managed to stutter, “Ah, I’m sorry, what w-would you like me to talk about, sir?” She felt her servos seize.

But instead of a slap, Luseon gave her a look of sorrow she didn’t recognize. She caught herself staring again.

“So you too, huh?”

The court was suddenly filled with loud knocking sound, and Starbit’s reality shifted from the recreational hall to a dark void. She felt herself falling, trying to grab at something to break it, but there was nothing for her to take.

  
“Starbit!”

She jolted up from her berth, clutching the sides as she struggled to recognize where she was. Her systems blinked on as they gathered information around her.

I’m in the starship, she reminded herself. The dull light filtering in from the tinted windows of the ship told her it was that the solar sun was rising. The light stick had faded to a dim green, it’s original purpose gone to time. She shook her helm to try to clear it, still feeling the fuzziness of the dream and trying to remember what it was.

  
She made a noise when a knocking resounded through the ship, coming from the back hatch.

“Starbit, I swear if you’re not in there-” 

She recognized Luseon’s worried voice and scrambled off the berth to open the hatch, stammering the whole way.

“I’m sorry! I-I’m coming!”

She unlocked and slid the door open, the metal straining and scraping against the frame. Starbit screwed her optics against the sudden light. She was met with the forms to two mechs; one of which was Luseon’s, the other being an imposing stranger, although not much taller than Luseon. His armor was bulkier than anyone she had ever met and was a dull orange, a sharp contrast against Luseon’s blue and gold color scheme.

Starbit shrank back immediately, feeling comfort in the darkness of the ship.

  
Luseon sprang up his dactylins and walked in front of the other mech, trying to soothe Starbit.

“Hey, it’s okay, he’s an Autobot! He won’t hurt us.”

The Autobot crossed his arms, looking like he wanted to say something, but for some reason chose not to. Starbit noticed the scuffed Autobot insignias on both of his forearms, making her question the truth of his allegiance. 

She didn’t take her optics of the stranger when she asked Luseon, “Why is he here?”

Luseon couldn’t blame her distrust of the mech - he wouldn’t have wanted to be met with something like this so suddenly after waking up either. But he couldn’t help feel a little hurt at her tone. “He here to escort us to the Autobot’s base,” he put plainly.

The mech spoke up this time. “It was probably better I found you anyway before you got hazed by the Con’s. The way you blasted the distress beacon was incredibly sloppy, even the human’s picked it up on their satellites.”

“What do you mean, ‘distress beacon?’” Starbit was only confused now.

The mech gave a disbelieving snort. “What, you didn’t even know you did it?”

Starbit motioned to the terminal she had spent countless hours on the cycle before. “If I did, it was from there. I... don’t really know my way around this ship’s systems, I was trying to start it back up to see if we could get airborne again...”

The mech strode past the other two and quickly booted the terminal, scowling at the sprawling data. Starbit fiddled with her digits nervously, feeling very vulnerable in the harsh, cold sun. Even Luseon seemed a bit on edge; the mention of the potential threat of the Decepticon’s finding them had set him off.

“No wonder you didn’t know what it was saying - this alphabet is ancient.” The mech supplied. “I don’t even recognize the build of this model...” He hopped off the terminal and walked around the ship as if sizing it up. Starbit stared as he did a complete walk-around, wringing her dactylins. The mech stroked his lower faceplate contemplatively as he finished his orbit.

“How did you even fly this? You two look barely qualified to change out an Energon filter.”

Starbit winced as she noticed Luseon bristle a little, his wings flicking up indignantly. “Hey, we may be small, but we aren’t stupid-”

She gently interrupted, “We just hopped on when we could. We were too worried about being caught that I fell on the console, and before we could do anything the ship was off. We didn’t pilot it at all.” That was an incredibly stressful event, she recalled. Luseon muttered in undertones as if to disagree with her, but she really couldn’t hear him.

“Where did you come from? What sector?” He asked, not looking at her, ignoring Luseon’s grumbling.

  
“Um... we came from a distant prison, at least that’s what it felt like to us. I’m not sure what sector though... There were a lot of asteroids, and we orbited twin stars...” Starbit tried desperately to remember what the guards called that horrid place. 

Luseon piped up, forgetting his annoyance. “We were captured from a militia sanctioned by Megatron. I think they called it Castux Station?” He shuddered at the Decepticon’s name.

The mech whipped around, startling Luseon. “Megatron?”

“Y-yeah?”

“He’s been dead for years,” the mech countered, confusion plain of his face. Starbit and Luseon only reflected his expression. Surely he was wrong? They had both seen him many times throughout their sentence at the encampment, there was no way he was offlined so soon. But before either of them could respond, the terminal pinged, and the mech rushed to see the new data that had filled the monitor. He must have typed in some sort of diagnostic command, Starbit mused, and walked over, futilely trying to make sense of the paragraphs.

“You didn’t even accidentally do anything,” he reported when she didn’t say anything, “It was already set for Earth. You must have just boarded at the right time...”

Luseon noticed how he drifted off the last bit of his sentence, now walking over. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

The mech’s amber optics widened in realization. “It was already set for Earth,” The mech scrambled to press his comm-link, speaking aloud. 

“I don’t really understand,” Starbit said in confusion, but he was already off.

“Prowl! Are you there? This is Crank!”

Prowl? As in _the_  Prowl, Optimus Prime’s second in command? Both Starbit and Luseon looked at each other in surprise. They both had been told the original Ark crew had fallen to Megatron. Surely this was a different Prowl...? 

 _But then again, Megatron is supposedly dead,_ Starbit considered.

“Who cares where I’ve been? Look, I’m sending you these coordinates, I’ll tell you more when-”

Starbit and Luseon sat awkwardly as they watched the mech’s - no, Crank’s - faceplate scrunch in annoyance. The Prowl on the other end must have interrupted him. 

“Well, to be frank, I couldn’t give a skidplate what your logic dictates,” He practically snarled. “We both know what Perceptor detected a few nights ago and I think I managed to find it. Decrypt the coords; I’ll be waiting, and send some mechs with you,” Crank made sure to emphasize the last bit of his sentence. 

Starbit felt a sprig of hope wriggle its way into her spark. She only knew of one distinct Autobot to follow a strict logic. If Prowl was still here, then most Autobots reported to be slain must have been as well. She saw her excited apprehension reflected in Luseon’s face, but his quickly turned to worry as Crank turned to face them. His optics were set to the sky as if searching or something. Stabit flinched as she heard some sort of crackling resound over the forest as if the sky was being sheared. Crank stiffened against the noise.

“I don’t think we’re going to be getting out of here without a fight. Do either of you know you way around a blaster?”

Starbit paled when she realized what he meant, lifting her gaze to the sky fearfully. Luseon, however shaky he was, though, lifted his helm and brandished a blaster confidently from his subspace. Crank regarded the weapon with sharp interest. “That will most definitely do,” he practically purred, continuing. “I’m gonna admit, as much as I hate any sort of stink with the ‘Cons, I’ve been getting the bad case of itchy hands.” He shifted his dactylins - hands? -  into rugged blasters that hummed rhythmically.

Starbit felt her systems clinch. Luseon noticed this, clipping his blaster to a hip and gently holding her shoulder plating to soothe her back into reality.

“Starbit, cycle some air through, it’ll be okay.” Although he was terrified, he forced himself to be calm for her sake.

“No, please, I don’t want you to get hurt,” she started, feeling her voice starting to crack, but Luseon shook his helm.

“Nor do I you, that’s why you’re going to be waiting in the ship. I’ve had training. I know how to fight, okay?” Luseon willed her to lock optics, and after a moment she nodded reluctantly. “Alright, just wait in the ship, I won’t let them get to you.” 

Starbit briefly felt like he was making an empty promise, but whatever either of them thought, she couldn’t find the words to argue. Instead, she hurried into the cargo bay, urging the door close with a thud. She hugged her legs close to her chassis, trying to fight against the habitual feeling of panic. Despite her efforts, her systems started to convulse, and she coughed up sour-tasting energon. “Oh Primus, protect them,” she pleaded, willing herself to settle down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whaaa? im continuing this drabble fest? yeha!!
> 
> i beta my own work so im sorry if there is mistakes!
> 
> feel free to shoot me q's at opprotunemoment.tumblr.com <3


	3. Going, going...

Luseon had waited for the click before turning towards the clearing, siding up next to Crank. The mech was looking to the sky again, this time more focused somewhere on the horizon. Luseon followed his gaze above the trees and noticed three distinct dots growing steadily larger. A wave of dismay washed over him as he realized they weren’t just jets - emblazoned proudly on their left wings was a glittering Decepticon insignia. Crank readied himself as the trio dive-bombed into the clearing, rumbling the earth with their combined landing. Luseon didn’t loosen his grip on his blaster, though his trembling servos betrayed his confidence

The seekers loomed several meters away from them, the leader smirking. They were decidedly more Cybertronian-looking compared to Crank, their curves and etched runes glinting in the late sun. Each of them had relatively the same build, the only thing differing being the paint job. No one dared to move.

“A bit of ways from home, aren’t you, ‘Bot?” The leader, a tall red, blue, and silver seeker, drawled with a disgusting arrogance.

Crank only replied with a glare of determined hatred. “That makes the two of us,” he replied evenly. Luseon could feel some sort of static energy build up beyond him, and instantly knew they had some trouble brewing. He narrowed his optics, trying to prepare for whatever they were going to do next.

Instead, though, the leader continued, “So it seems. I suppose you got the distress call as well? I doubt this is all that came out of that pod,” The seeker made a general motion to Luseon, who felt his wingtips burn in a mix of rage and embarrassment. He was small, even for a Praxian, and he fought the urge to spit a scathing retort, but wisely decided against it.

“What’s it to ya?” Crank replied testily.

The Decepticon’s optics flashed, his voice like silk. “A way off this Primus-forsaken mudball. Tell you what - I’ll cut a deal with you!” He gave Crank a wicked smile, tilting his head to one side. “You let us have that pod behind you, along with whatever is in it, and we let you both escape...” He looked to his companions, the purple seeker eyeing the metal door behind Luseon and Crank hungrily, digits twitching. “...Alive,” The leader finished.

The blue jet was suspiciously quiet, though was equally intrigued. Something told Luseon he didn’t just want the pod to escape, and he forced himself not to gasp in realization.

Luseon felt his Energon run cold, they couldn’t possibly know Starbit was in there!

Crank still held his ground. “It’s no use to you, I already tried making it run. The can’s trashed.”

“Ha! We both know you’re lying, Autobot,” The purple seeker sneered, “You wouldn’t know Decepticon technology if you had it downloaded straight into your core!” The seeker had paused to say more but withered under his leader’s scathing glare, who continued.

“Just hand it over. I won’t ask another time. We both know what happened last time, don’t we?” 

Luseon dared a glance at Crank, who seemed to be in a painful memory. He struck a circuit, Luseon realized, as Crank’s optics blazed with rage.

“I’ll make you eat those words, Starscream!” Crank rushed forward, with fists instead of cannons. Luseon cried out to him, alarmed he would try such a move, and even more frightened when he realized that this wasn’t just any trine - it was Starscream’s.

“Ah! There’s the Crank I know! Skywarp!”

Suddenly, the purple seeker vanished. Starscream had deftly dodged Crank’s lunge, and with Starscream’s order, the blue seeker pounded Crank into the dirt, disabling him from hitting anyone. Everything moved so fast that Luseon barely had time to aim at any of the seekers, and as he lined up to Starscream’s helm, he was met with Starbit’s confused and terrified face in his sights. He immediately dropped the blaster to see Starbit in Skywarp’s clutches.

Luseon broke his silence. “No! Let her go - agh!” He cried out in agony as he felt a harsh blow against his wings, and felt the wind knocked out of him as a pede shoved him into the ground. He let out a thin wail as whatever behind him wrenched his right wing down, feeling his optics waver against the pain.

“Aw Crank, you make this too easy! What kind of pathetic piece of scrap did you recruit this time? He’s practically a sparkling! And a Praxian? I didn’t know we were sport hunting, but well, I’m not very much complaining!” Starscream cackled with pure joy. Luseon couldn’t hear a reply from Crank. He angled his face to see the orange mech no longer fighting against Thundercracker; he was completely motionless, his optics blank.

“Cr...ank,” He mustered, trying to reach for him, before letting out another cry as Starscream pressed harder down on his wings. He felt a panic rise in his chassis as he realized that his wing-cons were tearing, and he struggled harder against the weight.

“Keep still, runt! Unlike your friend, I need you alive, to send a message to our lovely Autobots next door-”

“You can send your regards right here, Starscream,” A new voice called out cooly. It took all of Luseon’s strength to move his helm again. He saw a black and white mech with his companions aim a blaster at Starscream. His optics were trained on the Seeker, who cursed briefly before roughly lifting his weight off of the Praxian. Luseon couldn’t help but exclaim in agony again, cycling air through his system too fast against the waves of pain coursing through his body. It was enough to overload his sensors, and he felt the world around him grow duller as his systems fought to compensate.

“Prowl,” Starscream purred, holding up his dactylins in surrender. “Just the mech I wanted to see.”

The mech didn’t move an inch. If anything, his digit gave a small twitch. The only thing that gave away his resolve was his optics, a silent, flaming fury. The Autobot’s lined up alongside him - making five mechs in total - waiting for his order.

Behind Starscream, the starship roared to life, quickly lifting and gaining altitude. He smirked slyly as he felt the hot engines buffet against his backside. He stuck out his glossa, mocking Prowl’s scowl.

“I’d hate to cut this short, but...” Starscream drew out the last word, waiting for Thundercracker to catch his cue and follow the ship. The blue seeker quickly transformed and Starscream followed suit, calling out “Bye!” in a sing-song tone.

“Open fire!” Prowl bellowed, and the clearing was filled with the sounds of blasters. Luseon was dimly aware of being gingerly picked up, the handler taking care to avoid his wings. He opened his optics briefly to see a slag had hit a seeker’s wing, throwing energon and leaving a contrail of smoke. The sky was too unfocused to see who it had hit, though, and Luseon felt himself smile before slipping out of consciousness again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god what another chapter. i have work in 6 hours and this is how i treat myself??? i need to sleep lmao
> 
> stop by my tunglr if you gots any saucy tea: opprotunemoment.tumblr.com


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